


Vincent's 5-1

by Flowtonair



Category: A Way Out (Video Game)
Genre: 5-1, Gen, Humour, Swearing, Vincent's POV, inner thoughts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-05-25
Packaged: 2019-05-09 09:10:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14713247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flowtonair/pseuds/Flowtonair
Summary: The five times Vincent forgot he was an undercover cop, and the one time he wished he could.





	1. The Wall Walk-Up

“Help me open this.” Vincent says calmly, gesturing to the corrugated metal door.

“Sure man.” Leo answers, bending down under Vincent to latch onto the door. With a few grunts, the two inmates pry the door off its weak and rusty hinges, and they place it against the wall next to the newly made entrance. 

“This way.” Vincent says, walking ahead. Leo follows the older man, and they turn a corner to find a dead end. They step into the small space, and Vincent surveys the wall. Hmm. Leo looks up.

“Oh fuck! It’s too high, man.” Leo swears behind Vincent. He strokes his goatee, before reaching out to touch the metal wall, feeling the small digs in it. _What to do..._ “And nothing to climb on, either.”

 _Stating the obvious,_ Vincent absentmindedly muses, before he receives a brain wave.

“Here, give me your arm.” Vincent steps back, half-heartedly moving out his right arm as he looks up the wall. _That looks doable._ He moves his arm a little when Leo does not immediately follow. _I hope._

“What for?” Leo asks.

“‘Cause I’ve got an idea!” A small hint of eagerness shows itself in Vincent’s voice. _Might as well see if it works._ “Turn your back against mine.”

“Are you kidding me?” His partner’s incredulous response fills his ears, but Leo still stands back to back with him. It seems he caught on to what Vincent was planning, without even saying a word. _More alike than I thought._

“Just remember to push against my back.” Vincent moves to interlock arms with Leo, first his left and then his right. He could have expressed more annoyance at having to touch the sweaty hot head, but it is clouded over with thoughts of whether they would succeed or not. Vincent quickly calculated the risks of the situation, thinking about how they would have to pass some floors of the prison and risk being spotted by a guard. He still did not have a full grasp on Leo’s abilities, but he reasoned that with the fighting he has seen the criminal do, they would be fine.

“It’s never going to work!” Leo tells him, once they have advanced just a few feet off the ground. Vincent grunts softly, and tightens his arms around Leo’s biceps, though not clenching his fists to maintain a balance. Leo seemed to do the same behind him.

“Relax.” is all Vincent says as he tries to focus.

“It’s too high, man!” It becomes apparent to Vincent that he would need to supply some more encouragement to Leo. He hurriedly tries to come up with a reason as he attempts to ignore the sweaty back of the man behind him. It disturbed him to be this close to a man, or rather a stranger really, feeling his back muscles against him in such a musty, dark environment. 

“I used to do this as a kid all the time.” Vincent lies, with a practised composure.

“You’re nuts!” Leo replies. Vincent chooses not to respond as they begin the journey upwards, knowing that guards could be nearby.

It is difficult at first, as they struggle to establish a pattern without saying anything. At times, one of them is left a little lower than the other, and they have to wait to be level again. 

“Easy now,” Vincent whispers, not hearing any guards nearby. “It’ll be much quicker if we go together.”

Vincent leads the pattern, and once he thinks Leo has caught onto it, they progress at a much more steady pace. 1, 2, step. 1, 2, step. 1, 2, step. They grunt with the effort, and Vincent feels the dull ache in his legs and in his arms as they move upwards. After a small time, a thought of them falling appears in Vincent’s head. With a slightly louder grunt than usual, the undercover cop casts it away, and is brought back to reality by the ever increasing pain in his body.

Eventually, they make it to the top, and both of them let go of each other, leaning against each other’s backs. Leo is the first to move, scrabbling to the edge. Vincent moves quickly as well to his edge, and they heave themselves up with tired, but relieved pants. His muscles relax, as Vincent breathes deeply.

“At last.” His companion says, as he adjusts himself on the edge. Vincent notes his relief and puts some dots together in his head.

“Afraid of heights?” Vincent asks, quirking a brow.

“Something like that.” Leo brushes off the question quickly. **Too** quickly for Vincent's liking. _Ashamed of it, is he? Hopefully it won’t be too much of a problem in the future._

They finally look up.

Vincent scratches the back of his head as he examines the grate above them, screwed tightly with large bolts. _It was too good to be true, to think it was just an easily removable vent._

“Are you fucking serious?” Leo voices their shared thoughts as he gestures helplessly at it.

“A wrench would be nice.” Vincent quietly says, more to himself, as he contemplates the bolts. He looks down to see Leo hang his head in tiredness.

“There’s only one place you can get that,” Leo starts, moving his hands slightly as he spoke. _Italian descent, right?_ Vincent thinks, remembering back to reading the guy's criminal record. “The workshop.”

“Yeah.” Vincent says, not really knowing how to respond to the information. A part of him considers how easily it has been for them to get up to this point, and the lack of proper care the guards have. For example, if they had checked the sheets more, it would have been far more difficult to find a way out of the prison. _Perhaps more prison checks are in order..._

But he can't complain. This just makes it easier for him to do his job.

Vincent frowns as Leo looks down the wall they had just clambered up. _Didn’t you say you were afraid of heights?_

“I guess it’s the same way down, right?” _Trying to avoid the inevitable, are we?_ Vincent thinks, with a hint of amusement.

“Yup.”

“No childhood tricks up your sleeve?” Leo gestures for something, anything.

“Afraid not.” Vincent finds himself reflecting it - a shrug, essentially.

“Shit.” Leo shakes his head. The older man guesses he is attempting to psyche himself up for the return journey. Vincent’s eyes flicker downwards too and he mentally groans at the task ahead of them.

They awkwardly turn to stumble down again. All Vincent can remember of it is lots of grunting and an overwhelming sense of relief once they had reached the bottom.

 _Well,_ he thought as they began to head back to their cells. _At least I know now it really works. Those comics weren’t as full of nonsense as I thought._


	2. A Taste of Ordinary

_How is this universal?_

The smell of what Vincent could only describe as an “old couple’s home” was faint but noticeable in the house.

He felt it practically surround him when he stepped into the tiny walk-in wardrobe after his partner was done. He mentally shuddered as he examined the shelves of, admittedly clean and tidy, clothing. One of them must be a clean freak, he surmised as he figured out the right side of the wardrobe belonged to the husband.

_ Eugh. _

Vincent’s trained eye spotted a slightly disturbed section on the bottom shelf, presumably where his partner in crime retrieved his clothes from. He furthermore grimaced as he observed the discarded prison uniform hastily shoved away behind the neatly folded piles in the corner of the closet. _Disgusting._

At least we washed them regularly, Vincent mused as he stripped himself down to his briefs. He looked up suddenly.

 _Wait, did he--?_ Vincent looked around. _...No, thank God._

It seemed the old couple kept their undergarments elsewhere.

The air around Vincent began to feel stuffy and the thought of the old couple returning any second with his pants down came to him. He quickly found a dark, decorative shirt his size and a matching leather jacket with some comfortable trousers. He had to admit, whoever this guy was, had some good taste in clothing. Deeply thankful the clothes fit, he was relieved to not have to retry clothing like an indecisive teenager in a department store fitting room and opened the wardrobe door.

 _Carol_ , he thought with a sad smile. He remembered taking her out on those very trips, sitting outside the fitting rooms until she emerged…

“Hey Vincent, how do I look?” Leo snapped Vincent out of his thoughts by stepping into the doorway in front of him, donning a ridiculous feathered purple hat on his head.

“Stupid." Vincent remembered the clothing and turned back to retrieve their piles. “You really shouldn’t mess with their stuff more than we have to.”

“Aw, come on, Vincent. I just broke out of 6 months in prison, give me a break.”

“Sure, if that’s how you want to spend your time.” Vincent left Leo to his own devices for a few minutes as he hefted their load around the house, searching for-- _Ah hah, a laundry basket._ He dumped their clothes in. _Maybe they could be of some use later. Spare rags for farm work?_

Vincent passed by the kitchen and noted the unwashed dishes piled up in the sink. _Nah, I shouldn’t. That’s a bit far._

…

It was not long until Leo was stirred from his reading by the sounds of running tap water in the other room, and the clunk of dishware and cutlery together. He put back the book he had picked up from their reading corner shelf and, reluctantly, got off the comfortable reading chair to check out what Vincent was doing.

“You’re really doing that?” Leo asked when he stood in the doorway. Vincent let out a hum as he continued to wash up, scrubbing the dishes clean with a sponge.

“Might as well do something in return.” He heard Leo step towards him and the sound of pottery moving. The smell of freshly baked cookies wafted gently into his nostrils. “Really?” He looked over.

“Hey man, I told ya.” Leo took a cookie. “I’m fuckin’ starving, and the last thing I ate was a fucking shitty fish. Would you rather I steal shit from their fridge?” Leo bit into the cookie and let out an appreciative hum. “God these are good. Want one?”

“No thanks.” Vincent continued washing.

“Your call.” Leo shrugged. He took another one, before walking behind Vincent to the stove. “What’s cookin’?”

“That’s not our food--” Vincent turned his head.

“Calm down man, I’m just helping.” Leo gently shook the frying pan, helping cook the food a bit more. It had gotten cold while the couple had been out, and he increased the heat, adding a pinch of salt and some seasoning from the cupboards as well. “They’ll be hungry when they get back.”

_What?_

Vincent turned back to the final cups and glasses he was cleaning, and furrowed his brows. He… did not expect Leo to just do that.

“I might seem like a tough guy, but y’know,” Leo said behind him. “I don’t mind doing these small things for people. Just wasn’t expecting you to.”

“I couldn’t just leave it like this.” Vincent replied. He hesitated before asking, “Need a plate?”

“Yeah man. Dunno what they want to do with it, but we could leave it on a plate and all.”

...Awkwardly, Vincent did as he was told, grabbing a plate for Leo to put the food on. He did, and Vincent took the frying pan to add to the washing. Leo stretched and checked the fridge.

_This is pretty weird._

“Ungh! Gross.” Vincent turned his head to see Leo stashing an open beer back into the fridge. Leo noticed his gaze. “The beer. Was left out for a while.”

“Then why did you pick it up?”

“I dunno man! I was curious.” Leo walked past Vincent into the living area. “I’ll just wait for you to be done.”

* * *

Vincent headed towards the plucking sounds of the banjo once he had finished washing up again. Leo was seated on a chest by the window, strumming and cursing when he messed up a note.

“Fuck.” Leo gritted his teeth, as Vincent stepped to the piano. “Damn it.”

“Relax. Just play at your own pace.” Vincent fingered a key, noting the lack of dust on his fingers. Clean. Played regularly.

“Well, show us what ya got, Vince.” Leo smirked at Vincent, who exhaled with a smile. _Mn. Might as well._

Vincent and Leo stumbled on their respective instruments for a few minutes, both listening carefully for the old couple’s return. It seemed they had really scared off those horses or something. But alas, they finally got to playing somewhat decently well, and Leo stopped strumming. Vincent looked to him.

“You ready?” Leo nodded in reply.

“Yeah.”

“Okay!” Vincent didn’t even have to give a word to Leo, as he began to play a jaunty ragtime tune on the piano. Leo bobbed his head and felt the groove tingle in his fingers.

“That’s good, that’s good, that’s really good!” Leo grinned. Vincent smiled in turn as he watched Leo strum to it, and they began to strike up a good melody.

“Yeah, alright!” Vincent got into the groove more, tapping his foot. 

“Yeah, come on, Vincent!” Leo tapped his foot too, playing more enthusiastically as well. “Oh, you’re good!”

Vincent finished off the piece by tapping on a bunch of high notes rapidly before sliding his hand down the keys, from the highest to the low notes in a flourish.

“Nice! Didn’t know you had it in you.” Vincent exhaled with satisfaction.

“What can I say,” Leo put down the banjo where he found it and stood up. “I’m full of surprises. And mostly good ones.”

“I can tell!” Vincent replied, with amusement in his tone. They began to head towards the front entrance, to the shed.

“Yeah.” Leo looked to his companion with… appreciation in his eyes? Vincent turned his gaze away without any hint of his thoughts showing through.

_It could have been friendship. Could have been._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello there! Hope this was all worth the wait~!  
> Please remember to leave a kudos, and perhaps a comment if you can? It would be much appreciated.  
> Thank you for reading!!


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